ShanghaiJune 22, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — Amid the aroma of zongzi during the Dragon Boat Festival, Totole celebrated its 38th anniversary. Guo Mu, Head of Nestlé Greater China’s Culinary Foods Business and CEO of Totole, stated at the celebration that Totole’s 38 years are a vivid practice of China’s economic reform, opening-up, and high-quality development, with long-termism serving as the foundation for Totole’s continued leadership in the industry. Since its founding in 1988, the company has consistently resonated with the development of China’s condiment industry. From a pioneer in industry standards to a leader in product innovation, from a promoter of umami science to a practitioner of green manufacturing, Totole has spent 38 years helping to write the complete narrative of China’s condiment industry’s journey from initial exploration to standardized development.
Participating in Standard Setting, Driving the Industry from Chaos to Order
Responding to Consumption Upgrades, Meeting Health Needs with Product Innovation
Standards are the baseline, but products are the language through which companies communicate with consumers. Amid the trends of health and salt reduction, how to lower sodium content without sacrificing flavor has become a common challenge for condiment companies. Totole continues to drive product innovation around umami experiences and usage scenarios: First, by precisely controlling sodium content to maintain umami intensity, launching Light-Salt Chicken Essence, which has a sodium content reduced by over 25% compared to Totole’s Pure Fresh Chicken Essence, while still achieving a umami index of 2.3. Second, by using dried matsutake mushrooms and various mushroom ingredients combined with a corn fermentation umami-enhancing process, it creates a compound mushroom umami structure, allowing Matsutake Fresh to adapt to diverse home cooking scenarios such as stir-frying, soup-making, stuffing, and noodle-cooking. Through continuous product innovation, Totole provides consumers with solutions that balance health orientation and delicious umami experiences, also offering a practical reference for the transformation of the condiment industry.
In terms of packaging, Totole has gradually replaced traditional packaging with upgraded spout versions to facilitate precise dosage control. Additionally, under a production scale consuming approximately 35,000 chickens daily[1], Totole insists on using fresh chilled chicken as raw material, establishing a full-chain quality control system from raw material intake to product dispatch. Relying on a rigorous and comprehensive full-chain quality control system, Totole ensures product safety and umami quality.
Expanding Umami Science Education and Humanistic Care, Continuously Conveying Corporate Warmth
In terms of umami science education, Totole has built the “Journey of Umami” industrial tourism base since 2007, which has received honors such as a National Industrial Tourism Demonstration Site and a Shanghai Science Education Base. The base includes the Umami Museum, Umami Science Hall, History Exhibition Hall, and a fully automated chicken essence production line. Through scenario-based displays and interactive experiences, it educates the public on umami knowledge and modern production processes, having received nearly one million visitors from all walks of life.
In terms of corporate care, Totole continuously improves employee support mechanisms, having been awarded the “Best Workplace for Women in Greater China” by the Great Place to Work Institute for five consecutive years, and selected as an outstanding case in Shanghai’s civilization creation initiative. The company fosters a more supportive workplace environment by recommending outstanding female employees for global women’s career development acceleration programs, extending fully paid maternity leave, adding childcare support leave, establishing a Shanghai five-star “Love Mommy Baby Room,” and offering employee summer childcare classes. At the same time, Totole has formed a professional volunteer team of over 100 members, contributing more than 300 service hours annually, and was awarded the 2023 Outstanding Volunteer Service Team Award.
Fulfilling Social Responsibility, Putting Shared Value into Practice
For Totole, the growth of commercial value and the creation of social value always go hand in hand. In September 2022, Totole launched the “Love Kitchen” public welfare project, helping groups such as children with autism and adolescents with intellectual disabilities learn life skills through cooking instruction. The project has established seven physical Love Kitchens in Shanghai, Yunnan, Sichuan, Heilongjiang, and Qinghai, conducted over a hundred activities, benefiting more than 10,000 people, with some special trainees achieving employment. The project has received the 15th Public Welfare Festival’s “15-Year Business for Good Model Award” and the 2025 Public Welfare Image Award. From “giving a fish” to “teaching how to fish,” Totole transforms its corporate vision of “making life better” into tangible social outcomes.
In the field of sustainable development, Totole was recognized as a National Green Factory by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology in March 2026. Previously, the company was included in the Shanghai Green Supply Chain Management (Five-Star) list published by the Shanghai Municipal Commission of Economy and Informatization and the Shanghai Municipal Development and Reform Commission in 2022, and has received honors such as Shanghai Green Factory (Four-Star) and Shanghai Smart Factory, continuously improving production efficiency and environmental management levels.
Over the past 38 years, Totole has continuously participated in the development process of China’s condiment industry, exploring areas such as standard building, product innovation, umami science education, humanistic care, public welfare practice, and green development. Looking to the future, Totole will continue to practice Nestlé’s “Creating Shared Value” philosophy, driving corporate development to resonate with industry progress and social value creation through a long-termist approach.
[1] Calculation basis: Total tonnage of chicken raw materials purchased for Totole brand’s entire series of essence products in 2024 divided by statutory working days (1 chicken ≈ Totole’s minimum procurement standard of 1kg)